Category Archives: Boston

In fifth and sixth grades, one of my favorite moments of class was when we got to go to the library and read. There was a corner where the books on paranormal activity were kept, and I’d occasionally pick up a compilation on ghost hauntings and read a bit of it – only a bit, for I was soon too scared to turn the pages. Like the Loch Ness monster or the Abominable snowman, those ghost stories carried an unsolved mystery to them, the notion of something being off. They originated somewhere, there had to be something to them, but the veracity of it, the existence of such hidden evils, was always suspect. It was the only thing that kept me from going completely sleepless.

Black and white photographs of haunted staircases, of blanks walls covered in faded Victorian wallpaper, and doors slightly ajar, would come back to my mind at night, and I spent many hours frightened of every sound that emanates from a sleeping house. It wasn’t the existence of ghosts or monsters that horrified me, it wasn’t the damage they might do – it was the mystery of it. The absence of knowledge or proof was what bothered me, and that worked both ways. If it couldn’t be proven that they existed, how could it be proven that they didn’t exist? That same fear came to me the other day as I looked up at a poster of young man who was missing in Boston – Zachary Marr. On the platform of the Downtown Crossing Red Line, hordes of people rushed past his smiling image. He watched over all of them, as blind to their worries and concerns as they were to his, but I saw it all.

It had a title straight from clickbait hell: “Boston’s Mysterious Vanishing Men.” Of course I fell for it, then went down into a dark hole of conspiracy theories and paranoid speculation. For a few years, and in similar fashion, men in Boston were reported missing, then found dead a while later in a body of water – usually the Charles River or the harbor. In each instance, the men had gone off on their own, usually late at night, and often after a few drinks at a bar. They were all considered accidents, moments of drunken stumbling that resulted in unfortunate circumstances when a city has such easy access to water.

Still, something bothered me about these stories. Some vague underlying sense of dread and danger, some small seed of ‘What if?’ coupled with an inability to completely dismiss the connections made between cases. I don’t know the statistics, I don’t know how often such accidents happen. At the same time I find it hard to believe that such happenings are the work of some mastermind serial killer. As always, it’s the not knowing for certain that bothers me most. That’s what creeps into my head sometimes.

Boston’s lost boys, gone mysteriously missing then found in the water days or weeks later, haunt the most morbid corners of the mind, residing there partly resigned, partly pleading for help, partly at peace— or so we want to believe. It’s a haunting that spooks through its missing pieces, just like those ghost stories spun such fear through their very mystery.

I walk the streets and notice things differently now. The marks of men. The remnants of the lost. A single sock. A weathered Brooks Brothers collar point. A muddy comb missing several of its teeth. Ghostly items. Faded with weather and time and neglect. The forgotten. An eerie uneasiness settles over some nights now, and only when I lock the two formidable entry doors behind me do I feel a sense of relief.

UPDATE: Sadly, Zachary Marr’s body was just found in the Charles River.

When the snowstorm moved off at last, and the afternoon sun lit up the high-rise hotels, the scene was magnificent to behold. It was the sort of light most of us don’t get to see very much – the strange immediate appearance of the sun after a day of steady snowfall. Coupled with the rapid approach of dusk, the snow and ice took on layers of lavender – as pink and purple fought for dominance, and the fiery orb of salmon descended in the West.

It doesn’t often happen that the snow will alight so prettily on the branches and remain there. Usually it’s as fickle as the fluttering birds, especially when the wind begins. On this day, the wetness of the snow and the relative lack of wind allowed the beauty to last.

Looking like a cotton candy world, in the lightest shades of pink and blue, the effect is exquisite. It lasts only moments, as if such magnificence was not long for this universe. Soon, the light would depart, and dusk would take its place. An almost imperceptible shift if you watch as it happens, but dramatically obvious if you take your eyes away from it for any length of time.

The turn of the evening screw was at hand.

A fortress of red brick, a floor of warm hardwood, and a couch emboldened by the coziest blanket in the world: there is no better place to ride out a winter snowstorm than our Boston pied-à-terre. I’ve written of many magical nights here, safely ensconced behind its thick walls, buffered between the first and third floors, and it still thrills me to be in such a place when a storm strikes.

From the relatively safe vantage point overlooking the street, one can vaguely make out the towering Marriott and Westin hotels, along with the building formerly known as the John Hancock – though the latter almost disappears from snowy view on this afternoon. Somehow I’ve made it to the corner market for provisions, and soon dinner will be roasting away. There is wine as well, and a good book or two.

Bread and cheese, green apples and ginger tea. Something to hold until the main meal. A bluesy jazz standard plays on the stereo. It is a cozy scene.

Watching the world outside turn white, while the inside glows in amber shades offset by the celery green walls, is one of life’s contrasting pleasures. I pull the curtains open a bit more and strain to look down the rest of the street.

The snowfall lasts most of the day, but just before the light turns, the skies clear.

It is a majestic moment, rife with beauty, made more dear by its fleeting and ephemeral nature. Such splendor cannot last.

Grabbing a camera, I rush downstairs, without even a coat. I don’t intend to go beyond the steps of the brownstone, but the scene is so wondrous I suddenly find myself walking into Southwest Corridor Park, seeking the falling sun, and thrilling at the way it lights the treetops and buildings.

Clumped in the branches of the trees, and moist enough to tenaciously hang onto their perches in spite of the breeze, the snow looks like fluffy wads of cotton.

There are others out in the surreal air, camera phones lifted, each of us trying to capture the quicksilver moment, to freeze the beauty for some future end-of-summer day when the heat and humidity are once again unbearable. We yearn for what we have not at hand.

The onset of evening. The deepening of the sky. The glow of the snow.

A home away from home, and the glorious end of a day.

It begins and ends in stillness. With the gentle closing of the door behind me, the hushed sanctuary of the Boston condo immediately inspires a tranquility that I’ve only found here. In the mid-afternoon sunlight, streaming through the bedroom and over the hardwood floors, I let out a deep breath.

It is one of my favorite moments, when everything is pristine and bright. The possibilities of an afternoon unfurl in the back of my head. I set my bags down and survey any negligent messes left by my brother. Having witnessed the slow, and now rapid, decline of my parents’ house during his time there, I am adamant that similar destruction not occur here. Thankfully nothing is too bad, aside from a messy floor that he’s never vacuumed a day in his life. No matter, a proper spring cleaning is around the corner.

I walk into the bathroom, badly in need of a renovation, and make a few mental notes. A cracked tile trips me up at the threshold, so I gently shuffle it back into place. Pulling open the curtains a bit, I allow light to fill the space. It’s rare that the window is open, and the effect is refreshing. Something to consider for the future.

Backing out into the bedroom, I wearily eye the need for another coat of paint. It’s only white, but the closet and storage doors have never been painted, the walls are marred by scrapes and nail holes, and the trim is in need of updating. That’s in the future, though, and my ambition will only serve a bathroom project for now.

Here, I pause. Through the window blinds, bright bands of sun rays spill over the floor and bed. Sunlight, when this strong, is much welcomed in the winter, and it’s a luxury to be in this room, at this hour, when a long weekend is in its infancy.

The sky is that sickening shade of gray, portending something ferocious and massive. It rolls in slowly, setting up for the long haul, and there is surely something to be said for the calm before the storm. It’s a strange calm, though, one riddled with tension and excitement: impending doom and impending thrill all at once.

If you’re lucky, you have somewhere safe to see it through, some mostly impenetrable fortress where the strongest gusts of wind may only rattle and moan, but the cold and the damp stays at bay until it passes. I’m lucky.  Our place in Boston – at the end of a line of brownstones – is such a refuge, and it’s seen me through a number of storms. The heavy brick walls, and the ideal second floor location – raised from the ground, but still buffered by another floor above – lend it a cozy feel. During times of inclement weather, it is a safe haven.

In the window, a candle flickers, undulating with the subtle shifting of air. No matter how hard the wind blows from outside, it will not go out. No matter how much snow falls from above, it will keep a steady light. In our relatively small condo, it also provides a source of heat. Do not underestimate the power of this.

In my first winter there, before there were any curtains or stockpile of heavy blankets, I filled the bedroom with a multitude of tea-lights, and was pleasantly surprised by the heat they gave off. In addition to the soft, glowing light, they soon filled the space with their gentle heat. It is one of my warmest memories, in a sea of such warmth, and I think of that every time I light a candle now.

An unsurprising admission: I am easily annoyed. While I was waiting patiently in a crowded café the last time I was in Boston, groups of parents with their children milled confusedly about. This café, a favorite just a few blocks from my place, is sometimes crammed with well-off parents and their over-indulged children. This morning was no different. Parents and children alike acted like lost tourists, unable to work their way through the simplest of transactions, unable to pick out what to order after waiting in line for ten minutes. How difficult is it, really, to pick out your food, then buy it? We were on the verge of a melee, where the decision-making process had turned into some sort of historical summit. I maintain that if you stand in line for ten minutes and still don’t know what you want after staring at the choices all that time, you need to get out of the public space and go into hiding because you should not be around functioning people.

My usual MO for dealing with such things is to give the dirtiest, nastiest look to the offending parties in the hope that it shuts them down sheepishly. (Most of the time, however, if you’re dumb enough to not yet understand how a café works, you are too oblivious to notice any sort of withering glance.) At any rate, that was my frame of mind as I finally snatched up my coffee and a chocolate chip cookie. I was about to break free from the pack of idiots, but a mother and her two little kids blocked the door. (Apparently a door also poses a dilemma for certain people. What to do with a closed door?!)

They stood still, blocking the only way out, but for some reason I just didn’t have it in me to dole out dirty looks or mutter some dismissive ‘Excuse me.’ Instead, I moved back a little and waited while they kept standing there. The mother finally noticed me, and apologized, so rather than giving her a blameful look I simply smiled, looked down at her kids, smiled again and waited until they exited the store. It was a profound difference to choose a smile rather than a snarl, and it made a difference for the rest of my day.

Maybe she was at the end of her rope as well. Maybe she was dealing with things more sad and terrifying than I could ever imagine. Or maybe she was just an entitled jerk who didn’t feel the need to make way for, or notice, anyone other than her own children. It didn’t really matter. I took control over the only thing I could – myself – and I decided to be nice for a change.

It was a good change. I may try it again.

I will return to Boston soon enough for a few winter weekends, though I know it won’t be as weather-welcoming as it was on my last visit, where they had yet to dip below freezing. Here are a few photos from that visit, and they say more than I feel like writing at the moment.